40B yellow neo tank journal

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I am starting out with a 40B I grabbed at the latest Petco sale, just finished building the stand frame. Still deciding if I ...

I am starting out with a 40B I grabbed at the latest Petco sale, just finished building the stand frame. Still deciding if I am going to skin it or not. The tank isn't going to be out in the house, it'll be in a spare room (my fish room so to speak) so I am really not concerned about the looks.

Anyways, that's about it for now...not much I know...here is a quick pic of the tank and stand and I'll get one soon of the Oyaishi rock I plan to use in the scape. As usually, comments and suggestions are welcome...please comment...I suck at this stuff and can always use lots of help :proud:

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Next step is cleaning and paint the tank...back and sides will be black.

I like the stand. It is simple, yet effective. I am also setting up a 40B and I will be building my stand on wednesday. I am still debating on painting the sides of my tank black, so I am looking forward to seeing a picture once you paint yours.

Yeah, hope to do that this evening or tomorrow. I need to get into town to get the substrate. I stopped yesterday but the whole strip mall where TSC is was closed due to a gas leak so I couldn't get it. Sux too cause it's a 45 minute drive that I don't want to make this week. I just happened to be in town yesterday so it would have been convenient.

As far as the stand goes, I would suggest maybe just some cross bracing to prevent left/right movement. That or some plywood across the front or back. I have plans drawn up for a 120g stand and am contemplating the same thing (I'll be skinning it in oak though since it will be in the main living space of the house).

What you have is really good though, and if you ever do decide to jazz it up later you can easily add some hard wood plywood and trim pieces and make people think you spent $1000 on it =) So much better then spending $150+ on those laminated particle board ones Petsmart/Petco sell!

One thing I noticed is you mentioned medium/high light and Java Fern ... I don't think the ferns will like bright light unless you have some floating plants to shade them.

Not sure on the lighting yet. I have a bunch of Java Fern in my big tank that is doing well under medium/high light. Not growing the fastest but it's nice and healthy. I may try some industrial style lighting and use CFL bulbs and dome reflectors. Seems like they do well and since the tank is fairly shallow there shouldn't be much issue getting light to the bottom. If I could find decent 36" fixtures to use T8 bulbs, I'd probably just go that route. I could probably cut down a 48" fixture like I did for my 20g tank but I really don't want to go to the trouble if I can avoid it. I figure 2 36" T8's would keep me in low light but bright enough to see well.

Started painting the sides and back black. Should be done tomorrow. I also DIY'ed a 48" shop light to fit over my tank. According to some charts I read, that should put me in the medium light range. Here is the little write up I did on the DIY....

Not really a serious DIY, just a simple modification. I thought I'd throw this up in case anyone else is looking for a inexpensive lighting option for a 40B or other 36" tank.

I had on hand an old 48" shop light I was using on my 75g before switching to T5. I found some 36" bulbs in 6500k at my local Lowes. After not being able to find a suitable fixture for those bulbs, I decided I would make my old fixture work.

So I got the bulbs and once home, I disassembled one end of the shop light. I installed the bulbs so that I could get a proper measurement where the end-cap needed moved to.

Marked the fixture, took it outside and drew a straight line all the way across.

Using my angle grinder and a cutoff disc, I made short work of the fixture. Don't forget to wear your safety glasses.

Fitted the end-cap and a few pop rivets and it is nice a secure.

Cut the wiring down to length, soldered the connections, and used heat shrink tubing to make sure the connection was good.

Finally, installed the bulbs and fired it up.

So there you have it, a little DIY, less than $20, and you can have a decent medium level light over your 40B.

One step closer, tank is painted though it's a really crappy job. Not sure what happened but seems there are spots on the tank that didn't accept the paint despite cleaning it well with alcohol. I'll have to touch them up later or use black tape to cover up the spots.

I also played around with my main rock of focus, my Oyaishi rock if you will. I have a few supporting rocks too, just didn't bring them in. I might go out and see if I can find anything else that would work better. But here is a quick shot of what I have to work with. I am debating on doing a Iwagumi style hardscape keeping nice and simple or building a kinda cliff type layout with a nice high shelf in the left corner built up behind the main rock and a retaining wall of other rocks. This shelf would extend from the back to about halfway to the front and from the left side to about mid tank. I have some ideas on how to make the shelf but I need to get into town to check the availability of supplies. Anyways, quick shot of my Oyaishi rock....

Don't mind the dirty glass and little bit of substrate. I just added enough to cover the bottom glass so I could get a better idea how things would look. There will be a lot more substrate in there when it's all finished.

Well, tank is setup, water in, filters flowing, heater heating...I'll get some plants in tomorrow, acclimate the shrimp, and get some pics. I am realizing that I will probably need to upgrade the lights as the two 30w T12's aren't really cutting it so for the time being I am adding a couple clipons with CLF bulbs to supplement. I am also using two sponge filters powered by an airpump. Not really diggin' that setup. I might change to one sponge with a small powerhead and invest in a small canister. That way I have my sponge, have some flow from the powerhead, polishing from the canister, and surface agitation also from the canister. If I decide later to do CO2 in this tank I can also send that through the canister. I am looking at the SunSun (AquaTop) line of filters. Anyways, just an update...stay tuned for some pics tomorrow once everything is settles a little better.

Oh, and I also grabbed a 20L from Petco over the weekend. I plan to use it for breeding out higher end RCS and I REALLY want to get a couple varieties of tiger shrimp so I'll probably be setting it up to accommodate tigers (are their needs much different from RCS) and I want to do the same with the 40B so I can get a second variety in that tank. Looking at either Super Tigers or Red Stripes and OEBT's.